Adding a 744-megawatt power-generating unit to Serbia’s
Nikola Tesla thermal plants complex, opening a nearby coal mine
and developing separate facilities that will use biomass as fuel
will cost more than 2 billion euros ($2.75 billion), said
Dragomir Markovic, the general manager of the Serbian company
also known as EPS.

“A financing agreement may be reached in the first quarter
of next year,” after which it would take five years to complete
the projects, Markovic said after signing the cooperation
protocol with Zimin Gao, chairman of the Shenzhen Energy Group.

Serbia’s state-run power producer has sought investors and
project partners as it prepares for a market liberalization over
the next three years. Serbia changed its energy law in July to
adapt it to the European Union, which it aspires to join.

The Chinese companies will be majority owners in a planned
joint venture that will handle the projects, Markovic said,
without specifying stakes.

An EPS tender seeking a partner for a third unit at the
Nikola Tesla B plant failed earlier this year, after which the
company said it would find an investor in direct talks.